Though it looks like our first attempt at a KickStarter is a bust, we are still please with all the new connections we have made. We appreciate everyone who has taken the time to reach out to us and give us feedback on our products. We feel confident that people like our stuff and that we need to work harder building our communication network.

In the mean time, I thought I’d share a picture of something new we have made (by “we” I mean Dan).

These are 30mm tokens that Dan made on our laser engraver/cutter.

The first one has a picture of a body that can be used in many games as a corpse token or a body to investigate/keep track of. I play the Resurrectionists in Malifaux so these markers will come in handy during those games.

The second token has a picture of cogs and gears. We see this token being used to represent scrap markers, objective points or places for a person to investigate during a game. With our gaming group, I see these being used for Maifaux, Infinity and our steampunk skirmish games like Empire of the Dead or In Her Majesty’s Service.

We hope that these markers will make our miniature games look even better and help people keep track of objective markers in their games.

As most of you may know, we have been busy at work developing our Old West terrain. We currently have a KickStarter going which offer a lot of our terrain at special pricing. Our goal isn’t to fund the sculpting/production of these pieces. Instead, we are trying to raise capital to invest in a roto and spin casters so that we can develop more complex pieces in the future. We’ve seen a lot of challenges with delays and fulfillment on other KickStarters and want to avoid this for our company by being as self sufficient as possible. Our goal is modest but it would mean a lot to us.

Just to give you a sneek peek at my latest project, take a look at the stone bridge I’m working on. it will come in two widths; one width for regular old west games and a wider bridge that will fit a Warhammer unit going across 5 wide.

I know it has been some time since my last blog. Things have been pretty hectic here at Six Squared Sudios with us getting ready for our first KickStarter starting on Tuesday November 11th. It is all about the old west and we hope you will be kind enough to support our company with your pledges.

This weekend we were out promoting our KS (and having some gaming fun) at Fall In in Lancaster Pennsylvania. It was a great time. I got some great minis and a steampunk submarine from Brigade Games and a fully painted river boat from The Miniature Building Authority. I got some other goodies too but I will do a phto show of these when I get home.

We did play a great steampunk game using the Gaslight system. It was run by a fellow named Steve who modified a lot of vehicles and machine to make an excellent display to play on.

If i haven’t made myself clear with my previous posts, I LOVE playing and collecting miniature games.

Some games come into my life like a bullet from a gun – fast and with great impact. Others creep into my life and linger in the corners of the time I can dedicate to games. However, only one game has stuck with me since I was a kid. That game is Warhammer Fantasy by Games Workshop.

before anyone starts booing me, I do realize that this game (and company) has had its ups and downs with the gaming community. Their dealings with the public, our friendly local gaming stores and their own product has had us all scratching our heads at one point or another. Still, I believe a company that has survived decades where others have come and gone needs some consideration.

For me, Warhammer Fantasy Battles was my introduction to miniature games in the 80’s. I had already found D&D and thought how great it would be to have a fantasy game that let you play out the epic battles. I wanted an Axis and Allies with a fantasy twist.

When i found my first Citadel miniatures, it was like a door opened up for me. These metal manifestations of the characters in my books and games let me recreate battles on my dining room table. I was hooked.

My first army were the Orks. I loved the savage nature of these brutes that was tempered with an almost slapstick comedy with their erratic behavior. After I built a fairly substantial horde of greenskins, I started collecting many of the other races. Dwarves, elves and creatures of chaos soon lined my shelves. I have always been a fluff guy when it comes to games. I need the rules and models to tell a story. Games Workshop knew how to do this with the Warhammer world. I needed to have models from the stories so I could make my own stories in the game. I owe a lot of my who I am creatively to these initial years playing these games.

Like many of you, my gaming hobby came and went as I grew up. I developed different groups of friends and there were years where my gaming collection sat neglected in the basement or the back of the closet. Still, I never got rid of most of these miniatures.

Around the time I started university is when I really got back into the hobby. There were clubs that played RPGs and eventually I found people who played miniature games. Often then games weren’t Warhammer Fantasy but it still felt good creating strategies on the table and painting models again.

Over the past few years, I haven’t played much Warhammer Fantasy. My gaming group did have people with armies but we were more interested in skirmish games like Malifaux. They were easier to field and the games could be played in a shorter amount of time. I still bought new army books and kept up with the Wahammer story but sadly, just didn’t play very much.

Then came the Nagash End Times book.

My friends and I love this book. It progressed the timeline for the Warhammer world and reminded us why we first fell in love with this game. There was an evolving world to play in and we found ourselves wanting to play out the battles in the book. I’m currently painting up a Daemons of Khorne army while my friends are working on their Wood Elves, High Elves and Dwarves.

To celebrate our renewed interst in army battles, i am sculpting themed movement trays for the armies. Like most of the other stuff available for sale on our website, the sculptures/accessories are items that we wanted for our own gaming experience.

Below is my first movement tray. It fits 5 cavalry models or 10 infantry on 25mm bases. It is a rock themed tray which can be painted with different effects to suit a number of armies. I did up a lava base for my Daemon list but also did a regular stone look to better suit dwarves or ogres. One neat feature I am doing on these bases is putting a small label area at the back. In our games, we were finding that we often forgot to mention when our units had effects like fear, terror or frenzy. These label areas are big enough to put a sticker on so that you can remember any special rules (or simply what unit is which). With the label area at the back, it doesn’t take away from the look of your army and it is easy to read from the controlling player’s side without you opponent seeing it.

These bases will be made for the popular formation sizes first and other sizes as we find want/need. Other themes we are going to do include woodland, brick/cobblestone and desert.

I hope you like them. If you have any suggestions on sizes or themes, please share in the comments.

Sometimes the best lessons learned come out of failure. This blog tells a story of such a lesson that came out of an epic fail.

I’ve been working on our newest terrain set – western town tiles. Like the river tiles, the western street tile will all be six inches by six inches and let you arrange them in countless combinations on your gaming table. Personally, I can’t wait for this project to be done so my gaming group can use them for Malifaux as well as our new miniature game Dark Age.

When i sculpt tiles, I use a variety of mediums from different putties, clay, wax and natural materials. Once I’m happy with the finished product, I use silicone to make a mold and then use this mold to make the resin tiles you see on our website.

For the western street tiles, I have been experimenting with a mixture of Green Stuff and Apoxie Putty. It holds detail really well and gives me a few hours of work time before it hardens.

Here is an example of the wooden sidewalk I’m sculpting on the tiles and the streets with the wear marks from the wagons.

My next step is to create a mold using silicone.

The type of silicone I use is mixed at a 10:1 ratio by weight. Our postage scale works double duty for this process.

We use to use a silicone that was mixed at a 1:1 ratio by volume. The reason we switched is that this silicone is a little more durable and allows for more pronounced undercuts ( undercuts are when the piece you are making a mold of has overhangs).

Once I am ready to cast a tile, I attach it to a board amnd create a dam around it using lego. Silicone doesn’t stick to Lego so it is easy to break apart to get your mold.

Here is where the “epic fail” comes into this blog post.

Silicone doesn’t stick to many things. That is why it makes such an excellent medium for mold making. Unfortunately for me, I found out that it does react to Apoxie Putty.

The silicone bonded with the putty and destroyed the mold and my sculpt!

Needless to say, I wasn’t impresed but I did learn a lesson.

So, after doing some experimenting, I found a solution. If I spray the putty with a light coat of an acrylic spray (primer or sealent), the silicone won’t stick and there isn’t a loss of detail.

Problem solved.

Now that this lesson has been learned, I’m back on track finishing the western tile set. I’m sure that it will be done pretty soon.

I just wanted to start by saying thanks for all the positive responses we’ve been getting for our river tile system – especially the people who have already purchased a set! We love making terrain and it is a real confidence boost when people think it is worth buying for their own gaming tables. It is very much appreciated.

We have a lot of projects on the go right now.

Dan, our tech guru, is working with our new 3D scanner to help us with scaling challenges for some upcoming projects. I dont want to give too much away but I’m sure it will DRIVE you nuts. We are also super stoked about our 3D printer that should be in any time now. Once we have this, it will offer us even more tools to make quality terrain with.

Brad has been pretty busy on a number of fronts. He just finished our new rock sets as well as a couple of vortex designs. He is also working on some additional terrain features for your fantasy army tables.

Me, I’ve been working on developing our western street tiles. Like our river system, this set will let you create a number of different street layouts to suite your gaming needs. Since our game club plays a lot of Malifaux and were in the Wild West Exodus Kickstarter, these will come in quite handy. We love our miniature wargaming and great terrain just makes the experience even better.

Sorry for the lapse in time since our last entry. I had every intention of getting the second part of my Historicon coverage done shortly after the first. However, life, work, home and prep for GenCon derailed this pretty quickly.

Blogging needs to be important to me for a number of reasons. The first reason is that I love games and want to share this love with fellow gamers in the hopes of making new friends and learning more about the hobby. A blog is not an ego trip for the writer (at least in my case) but a way to express opinions about something we love in the hopes of getting others to love the subject as much as we do.

The second reason is that we at 6 Squared Studios are trying to launch a business and blogging is important to businesses. By writing about the stuff we create and how we use it at conventions, there is a chance that people will find our blogs and visit the website. Once there, we hope that they like what they see and invest in our terrain for their gaming table. We want to develop a community that we can discuss future projects and learn what people want to improve their gaming experience. We are not some business that sells into a market. We are gamers that are making things for our tables and offering them up for others to enjoy as well.

Bottom line, blogging good – not blogging bad.

I am trying out some blogging tools on the IPad to see if it helps me capture the moment beter for this blog. If you have any suggestions, please let me know.

I just wanted to do a quick post regarding Brad and my trip to Fredericksburg VA for Historicon 2014.

For those of you who don’t know, Historicon is one of 3 annual conventions hosted by the HMGS. The HMGS, or Historical Miniature Gaming Society, is an organization that promotes the miniature gaming hobby along the east coast of the US. Their other 2 conventions, Fall-In and Cold Wars, happen in Lancaster PA – a much easier place for me to drive to.

Hello. My name is Kevin Jacobi though I’m know on most of the forums I visit as MiniCannuck – a proud Canadian gamer. So, on behalf of my business partners Dan and Brad, I’d like to welcome you to our website.